Those who are drawn to the darker side of John Lennon, the side from which came anomalies like the book A Spaniard in the Works or songs like “I Am the Walrus” and “Happiness Is a Warm Gun,” may find this documentary from David Leaf and John Scheinfeld’s about the murdered ex-Beatle’s political activism and his persecution by the Nixon administration a tad squeaky clean. It is, in fact, unabashed hagiography, not just of Lennon but also of his widow, Yoko Ono, who authorized the film and whose cooperation afforded the inclusion of some rare and astonishing footage and recordings. She did not, however, allow any tarnishing of John’s beatified image. None of the tormented, nasty, visionary, debauched, sordid, petty, or subversive aspects that in part made him the genius he was. And any references to Yoko as the evil woman who undid the Beatles and domesticated John are dismissively ironic.

What follows is a hymn to John’s martyrdom sung to the choir. It starts with his flirtation with radicalism, which, Leaf and Scheinfeld suggest, was initiated back in the 1966, when he said in an interview that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus. When he married Yoko, in 1969, the flirtation turned serious. The pair appeared with Black Panther Bobby Seale on the Mike Douglas show. Lennon wrote and sang a song (a previously undiscovered gem) for a rally supporting jailed activist John Sinclair. Anti–Vietnam War rhetoric and the Bed-In for Peace followed.

But in case you didn’t know it, Nixon and his cronies were a bunch of bastards, and they sicced J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI on the pair and tried to get them deported. Nonetheless, John got his green card in 1976, and they lived happily after, except that Mark David Chapman shot him in 1980.

There are gaps in this account that the filmmakers fill with a relentless soundtrack of Lennon tunes hammering home their points (and in some cases contradicting them, if you listen to the lyrics). The parade of talking heads includes just about every lefty who was alive in the ’60s and still remembers the lyrics to “Imagine.” (George McGovern even sings it.) The right, meanwhile, is represented solely by G. Gordon Liddy. Although the film’s implied parallels to our current situation are sometimes breathtaking, by the end you might be begging along with John, “Just give me some truth.”

A hero in the works This article originally appeared in the December 16, 1980 issue of the Boston Phoenix.

You had to be there Anyone who grew up with the Beatles will always be tempted to say what Ringo Starr is reported to have said to a John Lennon impersonator: “I knew the real one.”

Unauthorized! I think it may have been sometime in the 1970s that the term “unauthorized” became sort of cool.

The Straight Dope: Michael Jackson and the Beatles You think an overdubbed Beatles tune could be any weirder than a new Beatles song with John Lennon? Then again, "I Want to Hold You Hand" overdubbed by a guy with a hand on his crotch and his hair on fire would be pretty hard to top. But don't worry, it won't happen, or anyway, it won't happen as a result of Jackson owning the Beatles library.

Kurt Cobain This article originally appeared in the April 15, 1994 issue of the Boston Phoenix.

Better all the time In 2006, Apple/EMI released the Beatles-soundtracked Cirque du Soleil companion piece Love , which mashed together songs from the band's repertoire in stunning remastered sound.

John Lennon John Lennon’s last solo album of new material before his fallow “househusband” years arrived near the end of his “lost weekend” period.

We had joy, we had fun It’s hardly rare for bands to borrow local talents to add flair here and there to a record, but Dominic and the Lucid have gone above and beyond the usual guest spots.

Give peace a chance This year marks the 40th anniversary of John Lennon and Yoko Ono's Bed-In, which found the newlywed couple pontificating about peace from their Amsterdam honeymoon bed for a week. Decades later, the couple is still working together to promote social justice, with Ono publicizing exhibits of Lennon's playful, sometimes colorful, often childlike, works of art.